Santin Will Go Distance--800 Meters--in NCAA Indoor Meet

The 800-meter run has never been Frances Santin’s favorite event, but it’s the one in which she will compete when the NCAA indoor track and field championships begin Friday at the University of Arkansas.

Santin, a junior at Cal State Northridge, will make her first NCAA championship appearance in an event she uses to build her strength and endurance for the outdoor season and the 400 low hurdles.

The 400 hurdles race--which is not contested indoors because of the tightly-banked 200-meter tracks--is the event in which Santin advanced to the semifinals of the Olympic trials in July and it is the event in which she’s the fifth-fastest returning competitor in NCAA Division I.

“The [400] hurdles is still her main event,” Northridge assistant Jeff McAuley said. “She has run well in the 800, but the hurdles are still going to be her event outdoors. She might not even run any 800s outdoors.”

Santin, three-time City Section champion in the hurdles at Taft High, has run 2:06.92 in the 800 this season, but McAuley figures she can break 2:05.

“I really believe that she can probably run a lot faster,” he said. “She was sick at the [Big Sky Conference] championships, but she’s over that.”

Santin, who will run in a qualifying heat Friday, finished third in the 800 in the Big Sky championships at Montana State on Feb. 24 while battling a cold that produced congestion in her lungs.

She’s ranked eighth in the 21-runner field at the NCAA meet.

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Dee Scott of Northridge also will be making her first NCAA championship appearance this weekend.

Scott, a sophomore from Bakersfield South High, bounded a career best of 42-4 1/4 to win the triple jump in the Big Sky championships. She was selected women’s field event athlete of the meet.

Scott’s effort was 13 1/4 inches better than her best at the start of the year, but McAuley says she can go farther.

“She’s got more in her,” he said. “But you just never know how people are going to react when they’re at nationals.”

Scott, who will compete Saturday, is ranked 12th in the 16-woman NCAA field.

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Lauren Fleshman of Stanford and Michelle Perry and Jessica Cosby of UCLA will also compete in the NCAA meet.

Fleshman, a 1999 graduate of Canyon High, is entered in the women’s mile and in the distance medley relay.

Perry, a 1997 graduate of Quartz Hill, will compete in the 60 high hurdles and might run in the 1,600 relay.

Cosby, a June graduate of Cleveland, is entered in the shotput.

Fleshman, state 3,200 champion as a Canyon senior, was sixth in the 3,000 in the NCAA championships last year.

She also anchored the distance medley relay team that set a meet record of 11:01.56.